Skip to Main Content

Hours & Login Menu

  • Hours
  • Login
    • Library Search Login
    • Interlibrary Loan
Dartmouth Libraries Dartmouth Libraries

Global dropdown menu

    • Borrow and Request
      • Who Can Borrow
      • What Can You Borrow
      • Loan Periods and Renewals
      • Borrow from Other Libraries
      • Request Materials
      • All Borrow and Request
    • Collections
      • Digital Collections
      • Media Collections
      • Oral Histories
      • Collections Care
      • All Collections
    • Course Reserves
      • Find Course Reserves
      • Create or Add Course Reserves
      • All Course Reserves
    • Off-Campus Access
    • Records Management
      • Retention and Disposition
      • Confidential Monthly Destruction
      • Electronic Records
      • Physical Records
      • Retention Schedules
      • All Records Management
    • Search and Browse
      • Library Search
      • Databases
      • Journals
      • Research Guides
      • Maps and Atlases
      • Newspapers
      • Dartmouth Digital Commons
      • Music Scores
      • BorrowDirect
      • Archives and Manuscripts
      • All Search and Browse
    • Design and Produce
      • Audio and Video
      • Book Arts
      • Design and Digital Art
      • Equipment and Hardware
      • Software
      • All Design and Produce
    • Data Services
      • Research Data Management
      • Data Analysis and Visualization
      • Data Repositories
      • Data Workshops
      • Datasets at Dartmouth
      • All Data Services
    • Digital Scholarship
    • Publishing and Copyright
      • Copyright
      • Open Access
      • Publisher Agreements
      • Publishing for Faculty
      • Publishing for Students
      • All Publishing and Copyright
    • Research Help
    • Teaching and Workshops
    • Print, Copy, Scan
    • Locations
      • Baker-Berry Library
      • Book Arts Workshop
      • Evans Map Room
      • Feldberg Business and Engineering Library
      • Health Sciences and Biomedical Libraries
      • Jones Media Center
      • Library Collections and Services Facility
      • Rauner Special Collections Library
      • Sherman Art Library
      • All Locations
    • Accessibility
    • Events
    • Exhibits
    • Hours
    • Study Spaces
    • About Dartmouth Libraries
      • Council on the Libraries
      • Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
      • Friends of the Libraries
      • Library Departments
      • Strategic Framework
      • Staff Directory
      • All About Dartmouth Libraries
    • Employment
      • Staff and Professional Positions
      • Student Positions
      • Fellowships
      • All Employment
    • News and Highlights
    • Policies
    • Programs and Awards
      • Alumni Memorial Book Fund Program
      • MAD Research Video Contest
      • Staff Awards
      • All Programs and Awards
    • Contact Us
    • We're Here to Help
      • Students
      • Faculty
      • Alums
      • Staff
      • Visiting Researchers and Community
      • All We're Here to Help
    • Find a Specialist
      • Subject Librarians
      • Audio and Video Production
      • Preservation and Emergency Preparedness
      • Publishing and Copyright
      • Records Management
      • Research Data Services
      • Systematic Review
      • All Find a Specialist
    • Ask Us
  • Hours
    • Library Search Login
    • Interlibrary Loan

Global dropdown menu

    • Borrow and Request
      • Who Can Borrow
      • What Can You Borrow
      • Loan Periods and Renewals
      • Borrow from Other Libraries
      • Request Materials
    • Collections
      • Digital Collections
      • Media Collections
      • Oral Histories
      • Collections Care
    • Course Reserves
      • Find Course Reserves
      • Create or Add Course Reserves
    • Off-Campus Access
    • Records Management
      • Retention and Disposition
      • Confidential Monthly Destruction
      • Electronic Records
      • Physical Records
      • Retention Schedules
    • Search and Browse
      • Library Search
      • Databases
      • Journals
      • Research Guides
      • Maps and Atlases
      • Newspapers
      • Dartmouth Digital Commons
      • Music Scores
      • BorrowDirect
      • Archives and Manuscripts
    • Design and Produce
      • Audio and Video
      • Book Arts
      • Design and Digital Art
      • Equipment and Hardware
      • Software
    • Data Services
      • Research Data Management
      • Data Analysis and Visualization
      • Data Repositories
      • Data Workshops
      • Datasets at Dartmouth
    • Digital Scholarship
    • Publishing and Copyright
      • Copyright
      • Open Access
      • Publisher Agreements
      • Publishing for Faculty
      • Publishing for Students
    • Research Help
    • Teaching and Workshops
    • Print, Copy, Scan
    • Locations
      • Baker-Berry Library
      • Book Arts Workshop
      • Evans Map Room
      • Feldberg Business and Engineering Library
      • Health Sciences and Biomedical Libraries
      • Jones Media Center
      • Library Collections and Services Facility
      • Rauner Special Collections Library
      • Sherman Art Library
    • Accessibility
    • Events
    • Exhibits
    • Hours
    • Study Spaces
    • About Dartmouth Libraries
      • Council on the Libraries
      • Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
      • Friends of the Libraries
      • Library Departments
      • Strategic Framework
      • Staff Directory
    • Employment
      • Staff and Professional Positions
      • Student Positions
      • Fellowships
    • News and Highlights
    • Policies
    • Programs and Awards
      • Alumni Memorial Book Fund Program
      • MAD Research Video Contest
      • Staff Awards
    • Contact Us
    • We're Here to Help
      • Students
      • Faculty
      • Alums
      • Staff
      • Visiting Researchers and Community
    • Find a Specialist
      • Subject Librarians
      • Audio and Video Production
      • Preservation and Emergency Preparedness
      • Publishing and Copyright
      • Records Management
      • Research Data Services
      • Systematic Review
    • Ask Us
  • Hours
    • Library Search Login
    • Interlibrary Loan
  1. Dartmouth Libraries
  2. Research Guides
  3. Dartmouth Libraries Guides
  4. Film Studies: National Cinemas
  5. Czechia (Czech Republic)

Film Studies: National Cinemas

This guide highlights selected resources for various national cinemas.
  • Introduction
  • Streaming services
  • Afghanistan
  • Africa (General)
    • Africa, Northern
    • Africa, French speaking
    • Africa, Sub-Saharan
  • Argentina
  • Australia
  • Austria
  • Benelux
  • Brazil
  • Cambodia
  • Canada
    • Quebec
  • Caribbean area
  • Chile
  • Chinese cinema
  • Colombia
  • Cuba
  • Czechia (Czech Republic)
  • France
  • Germany
  • Great Britain
    • Northern Ireland
    • Scotland
    • Wales
  • Greece
  • Hong Kong cinema
  • Hungary
  • India
  • Indigenous films
  • Irish cinema
  • Italy
  • Japan
  • Korea
  • Latin America
  • Mexico
  • Middle East
    • Egypt
    • Iran
    • Israel
    • Turkey
  • New Zealand
  • Nigeria
  • Nordic cinema
    • Denmark
    • Finland
    • Iceland
    • Norway
    • Sweden
  • Pakistan
  • Palestine
    • Films by Director
    • Documentaries
    • Films by Title
  • Poland
  • Portugal
  • Romania
  • Russia & the Soviet Union
  • Slovakia
  • South Africa
  • South America
  • Spain
  • Switzerland
  • Taiwan
  • Thailand
  • United States
    • Puerto Rico
  • Vietnam
  • Yugoslavia & Former Yugoslav Republics
  • Transnational & diasporic cinema
  • Journals & magazines about film

Subject Librarian

Profile Photo
Lucinda M. Hall
Email Me
Contact:
Evans Map Room, Baker-Berry Library
Dartmouth College
25 N Main ST
Hanover, NH 03755
(603) 646-0962
Website Skype Contact: d1128r8@kiewit.dartmouth.edu
Social: LinkedIn Page LibraryThing Page
Subjects: Film and Media Studies, Geography, Polar Studies

Keeping up with the journal literature

Want an easy way to keep up with the journal literature for a national or regional cinema? And you use a mobile device? You can install the BrowZine app and create a custom Bookshelf of your favorite journal titles. Then you will get the Table of Contents (ToCs) of your favorite journals automatically delivered to you when they become available. Once you have the ToC's you can download and read the articles you want.

You can get the app from the App Store or Google Play.

Don't own or use a mobile device? You can still use BrowZine! It's now available in a web version. You can get to it here. The web version works the same way as the app version. Find the journals you like, create a custom Bookshelf, get ToCs and read the articles you want.

Introduction to Czech cinema

Czech cinema

The Lumière films were screened in Prague within a few months of their initial showing in Paris in 1895. In 1898, Czech filmmaker Jan Krizenecky produced a handful of short actualities starring comic actor Josef Svab-Malostransky. The first purpose-built cinemas opened in Prague from 1907, and regular film production began from 1910, with an adaptation of the Bedřich Smetana opera Prodana nevesta/The Bartered Bride (Max Urban, 1913). Literary adaptations were also very popular with Czech audiences. The subsequent development of cinema in the Czech Republic is tied to, and congruent with, that of Czechoslovakia (see Slovakia, film in), a nation formed in 1918 of which the Czech Republic formed a part until 1993. In spite of competition from neighbouring Germany, some 40 features had been produced by the late 1930s, with the Barrandov studios in Prague among the most advanced in Europe. Output was largely commercial, with Martin Fric a prolific director, but this was leavened by the more artistic work of Gustav Machatý, whose Erotikon (1929) and its sequel of sorts, Extase/Ecstasy (1933), attracted critical acclaim and an international audience.   ...

Kuhn, A., & Westwell, G. (2020). Czech Republic, film in the. In A Dictionary of Film Studies. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 16 Aug. 2022

Czech New Wave

A film movement associated with a group of filmmakers active during the political and cultural ‘thaw’ that took place across the Eastern bloc during the 1960s, and which manifested itself in Czechoslovakia in a period of political and cultural liberalization that culminated in the Prague Spring of 1968. Internationally successful, and considered the most significant film movement of postwar Central and Eastern European cinema, the Czech New Wave turned its back on the Socialist Realism favoured in the centralized film industry of the country’s Soviet-dominated years.

The middle years of the decade saw the appearance of some sixty films marked by absurdism and black humour, and characteristically featuring young non-professional actors performing unscripted dialogue. Štefan Uher’s Slnko v sieti/Sun in the Net (1962) and Milos Forman’s feature debut Černý Petr/Black Peter (1963) are widely regarded as inaugurating this new wave. They were followed by Forman’s Lásky jedné plavovlásky/A Blonde in Love (1965) and Horí má panenko/The Fireman’s Ball (1967), both nominated for Oscars in the Best Foreign Language Film category; and Jiří Menzel’s Oscar-winning Ostre sledované vlaky/Closely Observed Trains (1966). Other key films of the Czech New Wave include Vera Chytilova’s freewheeling feminist farce Sedmikrásky/Daisies (1966); Obchod na korze/The Shop on Main Street (Ján Kadár and Elmar Klos, 1965), winner of the 1966 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film; Intimní osvetlení/Intimate Lighting (Ivan Passer, 1965); and Valerie a týden divů/Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (Jaromil Jireš, 1970). Following the repression of the Prague Spring, many of the filmmakers fled into exile, with Milos Forman and Ivan Passer moving to the US to embark on successful careers in Hollywood. Shivendra Singh Dungarpur’s documentary CzechMate: In Search of Jiři Menzel (India, 2018) includes interviews with Forman, Passer, and Chytilova as well as with Menzel himself.   ...

Kuhn, A., & Westwell, G. (2020). Czech New Wave. In A Dictionary of Film Studies. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 9 Oct. 2024

Searching the online catalog

You can use the subject heading below to find resources in the online catalog. The call number range is also included.

  • motion pictures czech republic
    Call number range PN 1993.5 .C94 on Baker Level 4. Please note: this is not the only call number range, but it has the most items.
  • motion pictures czech republic history
  • motion picture producers and directors czech republic
  • motion pictures czechoslovakia
    Call number range PN 1993.5 .C9 on Baker Level 4.
  • motion pictures czechoslovakia history

Introductory reading(s)

  • Closely watched films: the Czechoslovak experience by Antonín J. Liehm
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .C9 L48
    ISBN: 9780873320368
    This book collected interviews with leading Czechslovak filmmakers conducted mostly between 1967 and 1969. This was a period of immense upheaval beginning with the attack of the Czechoslovak establishment on the Union of Writers in 1967, continuing through the liberalisation of the Prague Spring in January 1968 and ended with the Soviet invasion in August and subsequent ‘Normalization’ process in April 1969. It records the testimony of several generations of filmmakers and their attempts to answer the questions about the purpose and meaning of film before and during this period.
  • Cover artCzech and Slovak cinema: theme and tradition by Peter Hames
    • On Campus or VPN
    • E-Book
    Call Number: eBook
    ISBN: 9780748620814
    This book is the first study in English to examine some of the key themes and traditions of Czech and Slovak cinema, linking inter-war and post-war cinemas together with developments in the post-Communist period. It examines links between theme, genre, and visual style, and looks at the ways in which a range of styles and traditions has extended across different historical periods and political regimes. Czech and Slovak Cinema provides a unique study of areas of Central European film history that have not previously been examined in English.
  • Cover artCzech new wave filmmakers in interviews by Robert Buchar
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .C89 B83 2004
    ISBN: 9780786417209
    In Czechoslovakia, in the 1960s, artists began to realize that the aesthetics of social realism contrasted with the realities of daily life; a movement of film arose in response to the politics and history of the nation. This work collects candid interviews with the creators of the Czech New Wave film movement (1960-2000). Their work put Czech film on the map of world cinema, generating two Oscars for Best Foreign Film, but the official critique marked them as decadent, pessimistic, and reactionary. ...
  • The Czechoslovak new wave by Peter Hames
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .C9 H2 1985
    ISBN: 9780520048591
    The Czechoslovak New Wave was originally published in 1985 and was quickly established as the world's leading authoritative English-language text. A study of the most significant movement in post-war Central and East European cinemas, it examines the origins of a movement against the political and cultural developments of the 1960s leading to the Prague Spring of 1968.

Selected book title(s)

  • All the bright young men and women: a personal history of the Czech cinema by Josef Skvorecky
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .C9 S513
    ISBN: 9780887780561
  • Cover artAvant-garde to new wave: Czechoslovak cinema, surrealism and the sixties by Jonathan L. Owen
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry PN 1993.5 .C9 O84 2011
    ISBN: 9780857451262
    The cultural liberalization of communist Czechoslovakia in the 1960s produced many artistic accomplishments, not least the celebrated films of the Czech New Wave. This movement saw filmmakers use their new freedom to engage with traditions of the avant-garde, especially Surrealism. This book explores the avant-garde's influence over the New Wave and considers the political implications of that influence. ...
  • Cover artThe Bohemian body: gender and sexuality in modern Czech culture by Alfred Thomas
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry PG 5006.3 .G46 T48 2007
    ISBN: 9780299222802
    The Bohemian Body examines the modernist forces within nineteenth- and twentieth-century Europe that helped shape both Czech nationalism and artistic interaction among ethnic and social groups--Czechs and Germans, men and women, gays and straights. By re-examining the work of key Czech male and female writers and poets from the National Revival to the Velvet Revolution, Alfred Thomas exposes the tendency of Czech literary criticism to separate the political and the personal in modern Czech culture. ...
  • Cinema all the time: an anthology of Czech film theory and criticism, 1908-1939 by Jaroslav Andel; Petr Szczepanik
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry PG 13 .M46 v.54
    ISBN: 9780930042998
    This anthology assembles some of the earliest Czech texts on film published in the period between 1908 and 1939, i.e., between the rise of art cinema and the outbreak of World War II, writings that were instrumental in shaping the various ways film was seen and understood in this formative period. ...
  • Cover artPrague in danger: the years of German occupation, 1939-45: memories and history, terror and resistance, theater and jazz, film and poetry, politics and war by Peter Demetz
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry DB 2629 .D46 2008
    ISBN: 9780374281267
    During the years 1939-1945, Peter Demetz was living in Prague - as a 'first-degree half-Jew' according to the Nazis - and he joins an objective chronicle of the city under Nazi occupation to his personal memories of that tormented, tragic period.

Finding scholarly articles & journal title(s)

Articles and other writings about Czech films can be found in different publications. Our collection does not include any journals which look exclusively at Czech films. You can use Film & Television Literature Index to find articles or use the search box at the top of the page.

  • Resource logoFilm & television literature index by EBSCO Publishing
    • On Campus or VPN
    • Database
    Call Number: Electronic resource
    Use this index to find articles about Czech or Slovak national cinemas.
  • Resource logoScreen studies collection by ProQuest
    • On Campus or VPN
    • Database
    Call Number: Electronic resource
    A comprehensive survey of current publications related to film scholarship alongside detailed filmographies. This collection includes the FIAF International Index to Film Periodicals Database and the detailed and complementary filmographies created by the American Film Institute (AFI) and the British Film Institute.
  • Resource logoThe web of science citation databases by ISI (Institute for Scientific Information)
    • On Campus or VPN
    • Database
    Call Number: Electronic resource
    The online version of 3 separate ISI indexes: Arts & Humanities Citation Index, Science Citation Index and, Social Sciences Citation Index.

Selected movie title(s)

Find more Czech films in the online catalog.

  • Movie poster artKráska v nesnázích = Beauty in trouble by reźie, Jan Hřebejk
    • DVD
    Call Number: Jones Media DVD #10571
    A married woman meets a wealthy, educated man, who causes her to question her path in life.
  • Cover artOvoce stromů rajských jíme = Fruit of paradise by režie Věra Chytilová
    • DVD
    Call Number: Jones Media DVD #4794
    ISBN: 9781565804654
    In this modern, highly stylized adaptation of the Adam and Eve story, a couple vacationing at a spa is offered the forbidden fruit of Eden. The husband, Robert, refuses to eat the apple, but wife Eva bites into the luscious fruit.
  • Cover artProtektor by Marek Najbrt
    • DVD
    Call Number: Jones Media DVD #19664
    ISBN: 9781461837435
    This fateful love story is set in Prague during the late 1930s and subsequent Nazi occupation. It focuses on radio journalist Emil, who is deeply in love with his glamorous Jewish movie star wife Hana. When the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia is established, Hana's career is cut short and Emil's radio station put under German control. Emil chooses to collaborate with the occupiers in order to survive and protect his wife. Ironically, this choice threatens to destroy the very thing he's trying to protect: Hana.
  • Cover artSpalovač mrtvol = The cremator by Juraj Herz
    • DVD
    Call Number: Jones Media DVD #8392
    ISBN: 9780788608018
    Karl Kopfrkingl works at a stately crematorium in Prague. Obsessed with his duties, he believes he is liberating the souls of the departed. With Nazi forces gathering at the Czech border, Karl descends into a mania that allows him to wholly enact his disturbed beliefs.
  • Cover artThe valley of the bees = Udoli včel by Frantisek Vlacil
    • DVD
    Call Number: Jones Media DVD #5733
    ISBN: 9781565805095
    A young son of a lord is sent to study with a Brotherhood and is befriended by a fellow member, who in turn leads him on his path to God. When he returns, he finds his father dead, his land barren, and his people with no hope.

Internet resource(s)

  • Czech Centre in London
    • Link
    Their aim is to actively promote the Czech Republic in the United Kingdom by introducing the Czech Republic, Czech culture, and various opportunities to the British public and professionals to support mutual collaboration and exchange. Their programs covers the arts: film, theater, music, visual art, design and literature and other disciplines with events organized in leading venues across the United Kingdom.
  • Czech cinema from Prague Life
    • Link
    Czech film history essentially begins with the "Czech New Wave" of the 1960s. The fundamental filmmakers of the era to know are Milos Forman, Jiri Menzel, Vera Chytilova, Jaromir Jires and Ivan Passer, all of whom made their debuts in or around 1963. ...
  • Czech Film Center
    • Link
    This center promotes Czech films around the world.
  • Wikipedia logo
    Czech films from Wikipedia
    • Link
    The list of Czech films is a list of films made in the Czech lands from 1898 to the present.
  • Lions of Czech films from the Avalon Theatre
    • Link
    A series of Czech films from the Avalon Theatre in Washington, DC.
  • << Previous: Cuba
  • Next: France >>
  • Last Updated: May 15, 2025 12:12 PM
  • URL: https://researchguides.dartmouth.edu/nationalcinemas
  • Print Page
Login to LibApps
Report a problem
Subjects: Film and Media Studies
Tags: afghanistan, africa, Arts, Australia, Austria, Benelux, Cambodia, Canada, Caribbean, China, Colombia, Cuba, Czech Republic, Czechia, Denmark, Egypt, film_studies, Finland, France, Francophone Africa, Germany, Great Britain, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indigenous films, Iran, Ireland, Israel, Netherlands, Nordic cinema, North Africa, Norway, Palestine, Poland, Puerto Rico, Slovakia, Sub-Saharan Africa, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Turkey, Vietnam, world_cinema, Yugoslavia

Dartmouth Libraries

  • Baker-Berry Library
    • Book Arts Workshop
    • Evans Map Room
    • Jones Media Center
  • Health Sciences and Biomedical Libraries
  • Feldberg Business & Engineering Library
  • Rauner Special Collections Library
  • Records Management
  • Sherman Art Library

About Us

  • Staff Directory
  • Subject Librarians
  • Library Departments
  • Policies
  • Employment
  • Accessibility
  • Federal Depository Library

Contact Us

  • 25 North Main Street
    Hanover, NH, USA 03755
  • Phone: 603-646-2567
  • Contact Us

Give Us Feedback

Dartmouth Libraries

Footer copyright

  • Dartmouth College
  • Copyright © 2025 Trustees of Dartmouth College
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • YouTube
Privacy Policy